A Prayer Answered, A Shrine Reborn At Franco American School Grotto

LOWELL -- For 100 years, time has taken its toll on the Franco American School's Grotto and its 14 religious stations known as The Way of the Cross.

In recent years, visitors to the sacred shrine have followed the path of the intricate sculptures of Jesus to find paint chipping from his face, fingers missing, and squirrels having made nests underneath the frames.

The 25-foot steel cross atop the giant concrete grotto was rusting. Still, people came, prayed, lit candles stationed at an altar inside the grotto and left notes to God.

"Dear God, please forgive me for my sins," a woman named Julia wrote in the grotto prayer book in August.

An anonymous visitor asked God to help with "financial difficulties."

Someone losing her way asked for a reason to live: "Dear Jesus, my name is Faith. Things have been happening lately. I'm going into depression.

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My emotions are flaring. I'm having bad thoughts. Help me through this bad time in my life."

For Billerica resident Kevin Roy, whose two daughters have attended the school for five years, the prayer was a bit different. Roy hoped for a restoration of the grotto and the 14 stations, which were imported from France in 1912.

On Saturday, Roy's prayer will be answered when a fully restored site is unveiled to the public, culminating a five-year mission of raising money and doing work.

"It's been a labor of love," he said.

A storied history

The Franco American School was opened in 1908 by 33 Canadian nuns as an orphanage for French-Canadian children, with the grotto opening in 1912. The site over the years has attracted approximately 1 million visitors, including celebrities Bob Dylan, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Jacqueline Kennedy.

Roy began his work five years ago, when the school wanted to repair and rejuvenate the 350-pound, 10-foot statue of Jesus on the cross that is located above the grotto in time for the 100th anniversary of the opening of the school.

Workers have touched up the site over the years, but unforgiving New England weather has deteriorated the historic site. Cases housing the sculptures were partly hollowed out from gnawing animals, screws holding the casings together were loose, and body parts from the figures inside the stations rolled around on the floor.

"I had seen it was in disarray ... so I said, 'I'll take care of it,' because I couldn't stand to look at it anymore," Roy said.

Roy hired a crane to take down Jesus, had the frame sandblasted and added a fresh coat of paint. He performed a similar resuscitation of the statues of Our Lady of Lourdes and Bernadette. The result was so spectacular, said Colleen Tully, the school's director of development, that the school decided to "build on the momentum" and restore the 14 stations in time for its 100-year anniversary Mass this Saturday.

Naturally, Roy volunteered to help -- for free. Starting in 2008, every Monday night, he would sit in the basement of the school and mold missing figure pieces from wood putty and paint them while his daughter attended a dance class upstairs.

"The hands, the fingers, noses, toes, feet, swords, anything that was missing I had to make," Roy said.

Although the work was progressing, neither Roy nor the school could afford to pay to replace many of the 14 deteriorating wood and glass cases, built in 1916. The cost was around $9,000 apiece for those that needed the most work. That's when the school received a charitable gift from former state Sen. Steven Panagiotakos, whose charitable foundation donated nearly $100,000 toward the restoration of the stations in 2010. Other people made donations too.

"It's an oasis of prayer right in the middle of the city," said Panagiotakos, who said he prays at the grotto several mornings each week. He said he felt an obligation to help restore the historic works. "It was nice to see that the foundation was able to do some good for the community."

So Roy kept working and working until one day last month, there was nothing left to do.

"I finally finished the Lady of Deliverance station," on Sept. 29, Roy said, "and I'll be in my grave before it needs to be done over."

Franco American School Principal Sister Lorraine Richard, who's been with the school since 1965, said she's sure the stations and the grotto, which have seen marriages and other memorable ceremonies take place under its protective roof, will only attract more people now that they've been magnificently restored.

"People have even come here to be baptized," Sister Richard said before a smile spread across her face. "And that's OK -- just as along as they don't do it during recess."

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